European no-frills airline Ryanair says it is to stop accepting American Express charge cards. They say Amex makes higher charges than most other companies and that they will refuse to take bookings on the cards from the end of June 2003. Ryanair emphasized that it would continue to accept other credit cards.

Ryanair reported a big rise in net profits in its last financial year. Net profits of EUR239.4 million (USD$281.4 million) were 59 percent up on the previous year and the carrier says it expects to see passenger numbers in 2003/04 to soar to 24 million from the present 15.7 million. They are predicting that they will overtake both British Airways and Germany's Lufthansa within three years.

And finally here is a very sad website, for all those who would like to “virtually” fly a Ryanair plane. http://members.lycos.co.uk/virtualryanair/AboutVirtualRyanair.htm